Henry Ford had an inline-five engine developed in the late 1930s to early 1940s for a compact economy car design, which never saw production due to lack of demand for small cars in the United States.[1]Lancia of Italy developed a 5-cylinder Diesel engine in the late 1930s for use in their RO truck series to replace the earlier 2 cylinder diesel and 3 cylinder petrol engines used. The subsequent model became known as the 3RO and was used by both Italian and German armed forces during WW2. This truck remained in production until 1950.[2][3]

A straight-five engine did not see production for passenger cars until Mercedes-Benz introduced the OM617 diesel in 1974. The first production petrol straight-five was the 2.1 R5 introduced by Volkswagen Group in the Audi 100 towards the end of the 1970s, developments of which powered the Audi Quattro rally racer.[4] An analysis of their use shows they were often used by middle-market brands seeking to extend their engine ranges into higher capacities without going for the six-cylinder option. In recent years the engine has been falling out of favour, with Volvo announcing in 2014 it would discontinue building them, for example.[5]

The five-cylinder engine's advantage over a comparable four-cylinder engine is best understood by considering power strokes and their frequency. A four-stroke cycle engine fires each cylinder once every 720 degrees — the crankshaft makes two complete rotations. Assuming an even firing engine, divide 720 degrees by the number of cylinders to determine how often a power stroke occurs. For a four-cylinder engine, 720° ÷ 4 = 180° so there is a power stroke every 180 degrees, which is two power strokes per revolution of the crankshaft. A V8 engine gets a power stroke every 90 degrees: 720° ÷ 8 = 90°, which is four power strokes for each revolution of the crankshaft.

A given power stroke can last no more than 180 degrees of crankshaft rotation, so the power strokes of a four-cylinder engine are sequential, with no overlap. At the end of one cylinders power stroke another cylinder fires.

In a one, two, or three cylinder engine there are times when no power stroke is occurring. In a three-cylinder engine a power stroke occurs every 240 degrees (720° ÷ 3 = 240°). Since a power stroke cannot last longer than 180 degrees, this means that a three-cylinder engine has 60 degrees of "silence" when no power stroke takes place.

Five-cylinder engines have a crank with 72 degree angles (except for the VW V5, which has an offset in the crank that corresponds to the angle between the cylinders; despite the V configuration the engine has even firing intervals). Most[examples needed] five cylinder engines have the firing order 1-2-4-5-3[6] Firing of one cylinder after another (e.g. 1-2-3-4-5 in case of a five-cylinder engine) is never used except in 3 cylinder engines where there is no alternative and in some V6 engines.[7][8] The reason[according to whom?] for this is that the resulting engine will have a strong tendency of rocking from end to end, as well as having generally poor balance.

A five-cylinder engine gets a power stroke every 144 degrees (720° ÷ 5 = 144°). Since each power stroke lasts 180 degrees, this means that a power stroke is always in effect. Because of uneven levels of torque during the expansion strokes divided among the five cylinders, there are increased secondary-order vibrations. At higher engine speeds, there is an uneven third-order vibration from the crankshaft which occurs every 144 degrees. Because the power strokes have some overlap, a five-cylinder engine may run more smoothly than a non-overlapping four-cylinder engine, but only at limited mid-range speeds where second and third-order vibrations are lower.

Every cylinder added beyond five increases the overlap of firing strokes and makes for less primary order vibration. An inline-six gets a power stroke every 120 degrees. So there is more overlap (180° - 120° = 60°) than in a five-cylinder engine (180° - 144° = 36°). However, this increase in smoothness of a six-cylinder engine over a five-cylinder engine is not as pronounced as that of a five-cylinder engine over a four-cylinder engine. The inline-five loses less power to friction as compared to an inline-six. It also uses fewer parts, and it is physically shorter, so it requires less room in the engine bay, allowing for transverse mounting.

A five-cylinder engine is longer and more expensive to manufacture than a comparable four-cylinder engine, but some manufacturers like Volvo feel these costs are outweighed by its greater capacity in a smaller space than a six-cylinder.[citation needed]

Five-cylinder turbos have been used on more than one occasion in sport and racing applications for their balance of performance qualities. The Volvo S60 R has a 2.5 litre turbocharged inline-five–cylinder engine which is capable of generating 300 brake horsepower (224 kW) and 295 lbf·ft (400 N·m) of torque across a large amount of its rpm ranges.[citation needed] The Ford Focus RS Mk2 performance car uses the same Volvo 5-cylinder engine, developed (by Ford) to very similar power levels, and is one of the most powerful FWD production cars ever created. Another example of a high power 5 cylinder car is the Audi RS2, with its 2.2 turbocharged engine making 311 hp.[citation needed]

A disadvantage of a straight-five over a straight-six engine is that a straight-five engine is not inherently balanced. A straight-five design has free moments (vibrations) of the first and second order, while a straight-six has zero free moments. This means that no additional balance shafts are needed in a straight-six. By comparison an inline-four engine has no free moments of the first or second order, but it does have a large free force of the second order which contributes to the vibration found in unbalanced straight-four designs.[9]

The use of straight-five petrol engines in mass production cars only became truly viable with the advent of reliable fuel injection. A five-cylinder engine using a carburetor fuel system has an unavoidable problem in that the length of the inlet manifold between the carburetor varies too greatly between cylinders at the ends of the engine and those nearer the carburetor for reliable and consistent fuel delivery. Using multiple carburetors (two or three) always results in one carburetor feeding more cylinders than the other, which also produces running and tuning problems. In theory individual carburetors could be used for each cylinder, but this approach is expensive and still brings with it the attendant difficulties in balancing the multiple carbs. Multi-point fuel injection circumvents all the above problems by feeding each cylinder individually from a central, single pump. This fueling issue was never present in diesel engines (except the Volvo D5) which used fuel injection from the very start, which is why large five-cylinder diesels were commonly seen decades before the type's adoption for automotive use.

Audi produced the first petrol straight-five, a 2.1 L SOHC engine, in the 1976 Audi 100. In 1981, the Audi 100 also became available with the smallest production straight-five, a 1.9 L variant.[10] Audi used 2.2L straight-five engines in many of their cars between 1976 and the early 1990s, including the 305 hp Audi Quattro and the Audi RS2 Avant with 315 hp. Audi Inline 5 engine is used extensive in Motorsport, particularly in Rally in the famous Group B with 650 hp Audi S1 Sport Quattro E2 and in IMSA GT Championship with 2.1 20V inline 5 720 hp Audi 90 quattro IMSA GTO.[11][12][13][14][15]

For the year 1987 factory team tested a 1000 hp version of the inline-5 powered Audi S1 Sport Quattro,[16] but that prototype was never used in racing followed by abolition of Group B.

An Audi five-cylinder engine as a power choice is very popular in European Drag Racing Championship, particularly in Scandinavian countries. With extreme modification for Drag Racing, the Audi produced 2.2 20V Inline 5 engines (like 3B, AAN, ABY, ADU) is shown to be capable of power in excess of 1 megawatt (1,340 hp)[17][18]

Since Volvo introduced their Volvo 850 in 1992, much of their line-up has switched to their five-cylinder Modular engine, with their engines also being used in Ford's Focus ST and RS models. All of the inline-5 petrol engines used by Volvo and Ford are built at the Volvo Skövde engine plant in Skövde, Sweden.

Volkswagen has used straight-five engines in their Eurovan, and have recently developed a different straight-five engine which is used in the Jetta, Passat, Golf, Rabbit, and New Beetle in North America. In South Africa, the well known VW Microbus/Caravelle (a passenger carrier) was later equipped with an Audi 5-cylinder 2.5 L (1991-1994) and still later a 2.6 L (1995-2002) water cooled engine, replacing the old air cooled Volkswagen 1,800 and 2,100 cc power plants that gave substandard performance to the large family bus. The tall straight-five Audi engine had to be slanted to fit below a rear engine deck, employing an extra electric cooling blower on shut-down, so as to prevent wraping of the hot aluminium head and inlet manifold.

The smallest straight-five was found on the Honda racing motorcycle, the 125-cc-class RC149, raced in 1966. The five-cylinder configuration was used because it shared components (and hence simultaneous development) with the two-cylinder engine, 50 cc, RC116.[better source needed]]][19]